[[quoteright:300:[[Webcomic/LeveL http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/leveLc4p107_1408.jpg]]]] [[caption-width-right:300: And he's even wrong about [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hair_hang that]].]]

->'''Senator Stampingston''': Gentlemen, it's clear that we're in a universally precarious situation. Dethklok has summoned a troll.\\'''General Crozier''': That's impossible, there's no such thing as trolls.\\'''Senator Stampingston''': Then how do you explain the dead unicorns? ''(The screen behind him shows butchered unicorns)''-->-- ''WesternAnimation/{{Metalocalypse}}''

The paranormal has a way of creeping into TV shows, even those which don't have a paranormal premise. In real life, being neither strongly skeptical nor accepting of various paranormal forces is the default, and usually a better option than either dogmatic belief or [[ArbitrarySkepticism dogmatic skepticism]]. On TV, characters are far less likely to express any doubt, and those who are skeptical are often treated as naive or ignorant, and the plot will go out of its way to prove them wrong.

For example, a character receives a psychic reading which foretells tragedy. He spends the rest of the episode actively worried about it. Various details foreseen by the psychic are borne out in the episode. A character who challenges the legitimacy of PsychicPowers will often be confronted with [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane at least one detail he can't explain how the psychic knew.]]

This also comes into play in shows that deal regularly with paranormal subjects. Characters who don't believe in aliens, magic, or whatever, are presented as hopelessly naive. Even when they're proven right about the main conflict being a hoax, something about the situation will turn out to be RealAfterAll.

Ironically the ''more'' heavily focused on the paranormal a show is, the less likely this seems to be the case. In settings with a {{masquerade}} ordinary people are often depicted as being ''so'' utterly skeptical that clear evidence of paranormal goings on is dismissed with a flimsy and [[WeirdnessCensor wildly implausible 'rational' explanation]], which itself is a form of [[ArbitrarySkepticism skepticism failure]].

There is TruthInTelevision in that [[FauxSymbolism people do believe in "mystical" things without proof]]. It just depends on exactly which things and who is being asked to believe.

Compare ArbitrarySkepticism, IfJesusThenAliens, FlatEarthAtheist, ReligiousRussianRoulette, HowUnscientific, and SkepticNoLonger. The most common manifestation of this trope is PsychicDreamsForEveryone. Compare also with ApathyKilledTheCat, where people are curiously un-inquisitive about fantastic things and events.

Contrast with InvisibleToNormals and WeirdnessCensor in which an alien, a robot and a werewolf can be having a fight in right front of someone's nose and still be ignored or dismissed. Also contrast PuffOfLogic, when skepticism causes the subject to be ''erased from existence''.----!!Examples

[[foldercontrol]]

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]* ''Manga/CityHunter II''--an anime which features lots of ATeamFiring but no science fiction or fantasy elements, has a girl in episodes 41-42 who can read minds with perfect accuracy.* Kyon in ''LightNovel/HaruhiSuzumiya'' experienced this trope when he realizes that aliens, espers, and [[TimeTravel time-travellers]] exist. He now regularly spends much of his time in damage control to make sure ''more'' of this weirdness doesn't manifest -- i.e. [[DefiedTrope he tries to prevent Skepticism Failure]] in the local unconscious RealityWarper, Haruhi in case she ends up destroying the world accidentally.* Seto Kaiba from ''Anime/YuGiOh'' is a shining example of a disbeliever to the point of seeing the past, his ancestor, and still brushing it off as fake.* ''Anime/ThisUglyYetBeautifulWorld'': Everybody is surprisingly easily convinced that Hikari and Akari are aliens. Also, nobody bats an eyelid when Hikari's servant, a {{Ridiculously Human Robot|s}}, shows up.* An episode of ''Manga/{{xxxHOLIC}}'' had Watanuki being tricked by his friends into thinking the house he and his friends were staying at was haunted (in an attempt to make him realise he can ask them for help). At the end of the episode they admitted to staging everything, except putting a blue flower in the kitchen when they first arrived. The episode ends with Watanuki looking up at the house to see the real ghost looking out at them.** One episode, Watanuki nearly got killed because he cut his toe nails at night.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Comic Books ]]* DC plays with this trope with Batman. A lot. Here's one priceless conversation from ''JLA 55#'':-->'''Nightwing:''' She's the one, right?-->'''Batman:''' Latest in a growing line of fortune tellers and "psychics" reportedly stalked by ectoplasmic entities.-->'''Nightwing:''' It's OK to use the word "ghosts," you know.-->'''Batman:''' If I believed in them, Nightwing, I suppose I could.-->'''Nightwing:''' Funny. Let's play word association. The Spectre. Samsara. Deadman...[[/folder]]

[[folder: Film ]]* ''Film/LeapOfFaith'' (1992) shows fraud and skepticism versus "real miracles".* ''Film/NightOfTheDemon'' walks a very noble line past this trope with a skeptical protagonist who approaches situations in a reasonable way right to the resolution of the film.* The protagonist of ''Film/FourteenOhEight'' is deeply skeptical right up until he realizes he's in a ghost story.* In ''Film/TheReaping'', Hilary Swank's HollywoodAtheist character is a professional debunker of miracles, who's pretty much shown to be a fool for her lack of belief. One particularly bad example is her claiming that listeria is responsible for a variety of things including a river turning red and maggots instantly appearing on a barbecue grill, which no real life debunker would be quick to do.* ''Film/StarWars'': ** Han Solo is a good example, as he ridicules the Force at first and later comes to believe in it and respect it.-->'''Han''': Kid, I've flown from one side of this galaxy to the other. I've seen a lot of strange stuff, but I've never seen ''anything'' to make me believe there's one all-powerful Force controlling everything. There's no mystical energy field that controls my destiny. It's all a lot of simple tricks and nonsense.** The coming of the prequels makes this somewhat strange, as Han is old enough to remember a time before the Empire when Jedi were pretty common sights, making him similar to a {{flat earth atheist}}. Some [[Franchise/StarWarsExpandedUniverse Expanded Universe]] material says the Republic has a million inhabited worlds but only a few thousand Jedi so most people have only heard stories, making this skepticism ''somewhat'' more justifiable, but only just.** In ''Film/StarWarsTheForceAwakens'', Han makes a point of saying everything Finn and Rey have heard of the Force is "all true".[[/folder]]

[[folder: Literature ]]* A running theme in ''Literature/TheSookieStackhouseMysteries'' is that Sookie is a telepath, a fact she hides with mixed results. But most of the people of Bon Temps, up to and including her own brother, would rather believe "Crazy Ol' Sookie" just has a knack for reading people's body language than accept the fact that they have no privacy around her. Averted in [[Series/TrueBlood the series based on the books]], where those who don't know her mistake Sookie for stupid, but those close to her know she hears thoughts.* Literature/JudgeDee often proclaims that he is not an impious man, as not believing in the supernatural was positively irreligious in ImperialChina. However he temperamentally prefers natural explanations for apparently ghostly phenomena and usually finds one. Usually. There are however distinct indications that the Judge himself is 'psychic'. Certainly he is extremely sensitive to atmosphere, often sensing evil before he even knows there's been a crime.* The doctor known as [[AwesomeMcCoolname Mr. Chillingworth]] in the penny dreadful ''Literature/VarneyTheVampire'' plays this role, both with regard to the vampire and the literal interpretation of the Bible.* The ''Literature/DresdenFiles'' has this in spades - basically any recurring character has to have this - except Sanya, a parody of the StrawAtheist archetype who survived ''possession'' (most of the puppets end their careers more abruptly), and is now employed by ''God''. [[note]] ... Aliens. Maybe. Sanya's actual point is that he doesn't know for certain one way or the other, and doesn't really care. It's good work and it has to be done, so regardless of the exact nature of his employer, he'll do it.[[/note]]** Dresden's theory is that the supernatural is damn terrifying, and it's a pretty normal reaction to not ''want'' to believe it. Like just about everything in the series, it's plausible to a paranoia-inducing extent. Possibly corroborated by Murphy's [=PoV=] short story ''Aftermath'', where she mentions that she's terrified of LetsGetDangerous Dresden, and if any muggle were to acknowledge the reality, they'd feel they'd have to kill him preemptively.** The majority of the Fey go to war ''over'' Chicago? Storms.** Necromancer showdown on Chicago campuses? Hallucinations from poisoned food.** Butters had this - in his first interaction with the supernatural[[labelnote:*]]second, technically - he got [[ProfessionalSiberia where he was]] by declaring the Red Court victims to be "humanoid but not human"[[/labelnote]] he continues to point out impossibilities during a car chase involving Necromancers, wind magic, and ''zombies''. Harry invokes this trope, and Butters has a brief [=BSOD=].** It's a sign of [[DarkerAndEdgier how bad things get]] when even the {{muggles}} start to shed this trope.* In ''Literature/TheWheelOfTime'', this mixes with superstition in wacky and zany ways. People will believe the absurd of Aes Sedai, and not the mundane. Aes Sedai openly acknowledge that they have no idea how ter'angreal from the last Age work... and refuse to believe in new discoveries or rediscoveries. Nobody believes Mat about the gholam, despite the presence of magic and previously-unknown artifacts. Admittedly, they haven't been seen in 3000 years and appear to be made of magic, but still, from someone who controls people who can ''call thunder from the sky, fire from their hands, and rip the earth asunder'', it's a little absurd.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live Action TV ]]* ''Series/{{CSI}}'': the episode "Stalker" had a man who kept claiming that he was receiving visions related to the crime, and knew stuff that the [=CSIs=] hadn't released to the press. By the end of the episode, he's dead, and there's [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane no explanation either way for how he knew what he did]].* Almost this [[RecycledScript exact same story]] appears in an episode of ''Series/NowAndAgain'', an ill-fated science fiction series from the late 90's about a man who was rebuilt out of spare body parts by the government.* The early run of ''Series/{{Battlestar Galactica|2003}}'' employed this trope in an ambiguous and unique way; several characters have had experiences that can be interpreted as prophetic or prescient, but whether they are in fact seeing the future or merely hallucinating was never explicitly revealed.* A major plot point of the second season of ''Series/{{Lost}}'' revolves around characters being convinced to push a button every 108 minutes in order to save the world. Jack vehemently protests the belief that anything will happen if they don't push the button, and the others treat him as if he is being completely irrational. Locke later losing his faith in the button is also treated as a bad thing, even though evidence seems to suggest that the whole thing is a hoax. Now granted it turns out pushing the button was necessary, but there was nothing wrong with disbelieving on the available evidence, which remained true of their situation for the most part, up until the end of season 4 (when ''anything'' was now possible and should probably be believed).* In the ''Series/MacGyver1985'' episode ''GX-1'', [=MacGyver=] helps a Russian psychic who is portrayed as real, despite Mac's skepticism.* Seen in an episode of ''Series/{{NUMB3RS}}'' where Charlie scoffs at a psychic who's brought in to work on a case; Charlie is treated as the unreasonable one, surprisingly for a show that focuses on math and logic in solving crimes. He returns in a later episode. And by the end of the episode he's dead and everyone wonders if he was the real deal.* ''Series/TouchedByAnAngel'' [[strike:claims]] revolves around how God works in mysterious ways even when you don't believe it. In one episode, God (represented or channeled by the main character) is "put on trial," but the opposing counsel falls victim to fallacious reasoning, both committing fallacies in his own arguments and being (especially for a trained lawyer) overly credulous of the opposition's reasoning. This in effect sets up the prosecuting attorney as a [[TheWarOnStraw Strawman]] for the defendant.* ''Series/TheXFiles'':** Played straight in virtually every episode -- in fact, it's the ''raison d'être'' for AgentScully, who remains skeptical of AgentMulder's explanations throughout the series, [[ArbitrarySkepticism despite the number of times Mulder is proved correct]]. However, after Mulder left the series, AgentScully then became increasingly written as the more eager believer, with the newcomer to doubt ''her''.** Subverted in the episode "Humbug" when Scully explains that she saw the killer, and what he was, but the local sheriff makes fun of her outlandish story (which the viewer knows happens to be true). Mulder, who had been skeptical of her theory himself, walks by and comments "Now you know how I feel."** Also, it is implied that Scully, especially in the later seasons, remains skeptical on purpose to make Mulder come up with proof for his EpilepticTrees.** Whenever the subject was religion, especially miracles, Scully was the believer and Mulder the skeptic.* There was an episode of ''Series/DiagnosisMurder'' where a series of people were murdered in methods that pointed to a vampire or something similar. It was all played as if the killer was mentally ill and only believed she was a vampire until she flew across the room at Dick Van Dyke. Very unusual for a show that was, as much as a TV show can be, very realistic.* In the finale of season 4 of ''Series/{{NCIS}}'', Tony's girlfriend Jeanne (a doctor) sees a little girl wandering around alone in the hospital several times, often close to people who end up dying soon. One coworker says she's seeing the Angel of Death, another says that it's just a regular girl separated from her parents. Near the end of the episode, the second coworker points out to Jeanne that the girl's parents found her. [[spoiler:But when Jeanne looks, it's a different girl, leaving the mysterious first girl's identity unknown.]]* An episode of ''Series/StargateAtlantis'' puts the characters on both sides of this debate. The character of the week is able to show others his oracle visions. Rodney is at first skeptical, until the vision he has is proven exactly correct, just not his interpretation. All the visions are shown to be technically correct, though it is impossible to know exactly what the context is until the event comes to pass and various characters come over to the side of believing (more or less) as events play out.* ''Series/TheBill'':** There's an episode called "Haunted" in which police officers on a stake-out in an allegedly haunted building recounted spooky but just-about-plausible things that happened to them (a lost girl with uncanny similarities to a murder victim; a woman who dies at the around same time as her psychotic and jealous husband, who left a message on her machine saying "I need you with me"), before ending with DS Stanton (the AgentScully) quite definitely encountering a ghost.** Another episode set at Christmas revolved around Sgt. Boydon helping out a guy who eventually disappeared into thin air, with the definite implication being that he was a ghost.* In the circus episode of ''Series/MurdochMysteries'' "Lady Minerva"'s fortune telling appeared to be genuine, predicting two murders before they occurred. (Although, since she knew more about the case than she was letting on, she may have [[MaybeMagicMaybeMundane "predicted" them more conventionally]], but didn't want to say anything directly in case she was next).* ''Series/MySoCalledLife'', "So-Called Angels." As Angela tries to help out her friend Ricky, who's just been kicked out of his house, she keeps running into a girl who gives her advice on how to help him. Finally, Angela's mother figures out that the girl's a ghost who froze to death years ago.* In different episodes of ''Series/PsiFactor: Chronicles of the Paranormal'', this is either played straight or subverted. In one episode, one of the investigators is temporarily replaced by an alien clone with reversed fingerprints. The entire team simply refuses to believe him when he returns to Earth and assume that he was drunk or just playing around. Heck, one of them assumed that it was a Doppelganger, preferring a supernatural explanation over aliens. In another episode, a rich elderly widow complains about her house being haunted. After the team do their investigation, they find out that there are no ghosts and that her family have set up a sound system and countless projectors in the house so that they could drive her insane and get her money.* ''Series/QuantumLeap'':** In the episode "A Portrait for Troian," Sam Beckett leaps into a paranormal investigator. Over the course of the episode, he plays the skeptic regarding the existence of ghosts, and Al plays the believer. By the end of the episode, [[spoiler: he has proven the primary haunting is a hoax, but then discovers that one of the secondary characters was a ghost all along. This is enforced with a shot of the ghost vanishing.]]** In the episode "Blood Moon", Sam leaps into a man who appears to be a vampire. Sam spends the entire episode telling Al this is ridiculous...until he glances into a mirrored surface at the very end of the episode. You can guess what he doesn't see.* ''Series/{{Castle}}'':** In the episode "He's Dead, She's Dead" a psychic is murdered, and supposedly leaves a letter about her own murder for the police. Beckett is skeptical while Castle believes it wholeheartedly. In the end of the episode, everything is wrapped up, except for one tiny point in the letter that Castle reminds Beckett of that seems to indicate the letter actually was from the psychic, proving her amazing PsychicPowers.** There's also the mummy mystery episode. Castle is supposedly cursed for disturbing a mummy's casket, and murder victims have been killed by apparently unfortunate accidents. Castle has horrible luck throughout the episode, while Beckett is laughing the whole time.** Another even more striking example comes from the episode "Time Will Tell," involving TimeTravel. [[spoiler: In short, there is no way the actions of the killer make sense unless he is a time traveling assassin.]]* In the ''Series/CriminalMinds'' episode "Cold Comfort", a psychic mentions that the victim will be found near a rocky shoreline. She's actually found in the middle of the city, but then the skeptical team member looks out the window... and there's a huge ad with a rocky shoreline on it.* ''Series/{{Bones}}'': For a show that usually promotes basing everything on cold-hard science and facts and mocks the very concept of the supernatural, there are several hints that despite the main character's skepticism, there is actually something to it.** ZigZagged with season 4's ''The Hero in the Hold''. Throughout the episode, Booth escapes imprisonment in a Navy ship while seeing and hearing the ghost of a dead war friend. InUniverse, this trope is {{Subverted}}, since all hints of supernatural activity are explained away by Brennan in a later episode as side effects of Booth's brain tumor. [[spoiler: Save for the fact that several of the doors in the Navy ship required two people to be opened, and that she unknowingly saw the same ghost at the end of the episode.]]** In the season 5 premiere ''Harbingers in a Fountain'', Angela's psychic friend Avalon Harmonia locates a mass grave. By the end of the episode, even Bones, the AgentScully of the cast, is a believer.** The entirety of ''The Ghost in the Machine'' is seen from the point of view of the VictimOfTheWeek's spirit, trapped inside the skull.*** Actually, any episode with Avalon in it can count as this.** ''The Shot in the Dark'' has Brennan being shot. While in the real world she's unconscious in a hospital bed, Brennan goes to an imaginary version of her childhood home with her long-dead mother inside. Brennan doesn't believe in an afterlife and rationalizes that this is her brain hallucinating. [[spoiler: Except her mother's "hallucination" tells her that she knew her father's first gift to her was stolen. In the real world, Max confirms this and claims he never told anyone about it.]]** Other instances where spooky stuff comes up, however rare, tend to turn into cases of MaybeMagicMaybeMundane by the end.* ''Series/WitchesOfEastEnd'': Ingrid spends the first episode declaring herself a "rational skeptic" who doesn't believe in witchcraft, until of course she's proven ''completely'' wrong.* ''Series/MysteriousWays'' runs on this trope. Declan firmly believes in paranormal explanations for the phenomena he investigates, while his psychiatrist friend Peggy always insists on finding a rational explanation. Declan's other friend, Miranda, is a brilliant physics grad student who is usually pretty open to the idea of miracles, though she has her limits. Some episodes give a fully rational explanation and Peggy gets to be smug, but most leave at least the possibility that something miraculous and inexplicable happened.* ''Series/DowntonAbbey'' had one subplot where Ms. O'Brien bought a Ouija board during the spiritualism craze after World War I. Almost none of the characters believe that it works and several of them intentionally manipulate it to mess with other characters. In the last ten minutes of the episode, Anna and Daisy see it spell out, "may they be happy." They're confused by the message and accuse each other of pushing the tile. What the audience knows, but neither of them do, is that Matthew is proposing to Mary at that very moment.* ''Series/ZeroHour'': Hank is not only a skeptic, he publishes ''Modern Skeptic'' magazine, and of course his doubt toward conspiracy theories quickly gets disproven when he encounters a real one in the show. This appears to be the only reason he begins as a professional skeptic, with a dramatic contrast.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Theme Parks ]]* In both versions of the former ''Theatre/GhostbustersSpooktacular'' show at [[Ride/UniversalStudios Universal Studios Florida]], there's a character who for a large part of the show makes it clear that they don't believe in ghosts, only to find themselves getting proved severely wrong by the events that follow.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]* ''VideoGame/SaintsRow 2'' is a mostly mundane WideOpenSandbox game where one of the rival gangs is the Sons of Samedi. For the most part, they just seem to be drug dealers who happen to worship the loa. Then you end up fighting one of their bosses, who has a [[HollywoodVoodoo voodoo doll]] that can make your character fall on his ass.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]* Played with in ''WesternAnimation/{{The Adventures of Jimmy Neutron|BoyGenius}}'' episode, "The Phantom Of Retroland": Jimmy scoffs at the phantom that supposedly haunts an abandoned amusement park. However, Cindy points out that ''everyone'' knows it's fake, but only he would be such a party-pooper about it. At the end, after a string of impostors of the titular ghost, the ''{{real|AfterAll}}'' Phantom shows up.* ''WesternAnimation/AvatarTheLastAirbender'' included an episode in which Sokka runs himself ragged trying to discredit a {{Fortuneteller}} that all the people of a town came to rely on. The problem was, she was always right... [[SelfFulfillingProphecy technically]]. Of course, this is specifically a world with mysticism of many stripes, so Sokka's main concern was that the town was letting predictions run their lives, to the point where they would not escape from a volcanic eruption because they were told it would be fine.* The ''WesternAnimation/SouthPark'' episode "The Biggest Douche In The Universe" had Stan say at the end that John Edward was a fraud and there were plenty of things in the real world that people could be fascinated by. It's a sort of strange message seeing as how the exact same episode featured Kenny's ghost being taken out of Cartman's body. An even weirder example is the episode "Dead Celebrities" where the Ghost Hunters come to look for ghosts and look like complete idiots for believing in ghosts, despite that fact that ghosts existing is the premise of the entire episode. Belief in ghosts aside, they mostly mock John Edward for being a fraud, and the Ghost Hunters for jumping at shadows and imaginary noises.* An episode of ''WesternAnimation/{{Fillmore}}'' involves a crime that takes place during the magic act at the school talent show. While working on the case, Fillmore tries to figure how the trick at the finale was done but kid who did the trick keeps shaking his head no. At the end it's implied he really did do the trick through magic.* Winston Zeddemore initially didn't believe in the supernatural when he applied to become one of ''WesternAnimation/TheRealGhostbusters'', and only signed up because he was having trouble finding a job after getting out of the army. He quickly changes his mind once he starts seeing the ghosts and goblins for himself.* Brian from ''WesternAnimation/FamilyGuy'' is a FlatEarthAtheist, and the show seems to agree with him... which would hold more water if Brian hadn't met God and Jesus personally, and that Peter hasn't died and met Death several times. Of course, the God and Jesus he runs into bear little resemblance to the religious figures beyond outfit and name. Then again, they're still shown to have genuine miraculous powers, and Brian never states that they ''aren't'' who they appear to be. Actually, he never comments on them at all, one way or the other.* The ''WesternAnimation/MyLittlePonyFriendshipIsMagic'' episode "Feeling Pinkie Keen" is all about this, as Twilight Sparkle spends almost the entire episode trying to debunk Pinkie Pie's accident-predicting "Pinkie Sense", but eventually has to accept it as a real phenomenon that just defies her understanding.* ''WesternAnimation/{{Kaeloo}}'': Every time Mr. Cat is skeptical about something such as aliens or ghosts, they turn out to be real and the cast encounter them wihin the span of that same episode.[[/folder]]

!!Subversions and Aversions

[[folder: Anime and Manga ]]* Considering ''Manga/{{XxxHolic}}'' is a highly supernatural anime, this was a bit of a shocker. Yuuko thoroughly debunks a fake fortune teller, noting and disassembling her verbal sleights of hand and keen psychological tricks. However, they later go on to meet a real fortune teller, who is pretty much spot on legitimate.** There was an episode where Watanuki presumed that there was a supernatural cause for the problems of a young woman that he helped. He notice that light flashed from her shoulder and he presumed that it was the cause of the problems. When she met Ms. Yuuko, Yuuko explained to him that it's actually purely physiological and the light just reflected from a buckle on her shoulder bag.* ''VisualNovel/UminekoWhenTheyCry'' loves playing with this trope, with Battler, the main character, representing logic and order and Maria and Beatrice - depending on whether we're on or off the board - representing belief in magic and the inexplicable. Most of the other characters run around in the middle, and shift their orientations throughout the story.* In ''Manga/TwentiethCenturyBoys'', the villains make all of humanity think it's faking increasingly outlandish threats: mass germ warfare, giant robot attacks, and finally aliens. The heroes are continually disgusted with how eagerly most people eat it up.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Comic Books ]]* In the original comic, ''Comicbook/FromHell'', by Creator/AlanMoore, one of the main characters reveals that he had been faking his psychic powers... yet every fake vision/prediction turned out to be true.* [[DCComics Dr. Thirteen]], the Ghost Breaker, is an interesting case. When he debuted in the 1950s, it was as a paranormal skeptic who proved alleged cases of the supernatural to be hoaxes - and in his stories, they were. When he became part of a SharedUniverse in which magic and ghost were very much real, though, he ended up looking like a FlatEarthAtheist. Later on NeilGaiman would explain that his skepticism actually prevented magic from functioning around him. [[/folder]]

[[folder: Film ]]* Averted in ''Film/BestInShow''. While the book does have a psychic, it does not involve any predictions that need skeptical treatment.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Literature ]]* While most of his friends believe in ghosts and a mind reading act, Tom is the one who reveals both to be frauds in the ''Great Brain'' books.* ''Literature/HarryPotter'':** You wouldn't expect an exception in a series that's all about wizards, but nonetheless Hermione Granger is utterly unconvinced by any of Trelawney's predictions or the Lovegoods' beliefs in creatures that, even by ''Harry Potter'' standards, are bizarre. The only correct Trelawney predictions are the ones Hermione doesn't hear in the first place, and the Lovegoods are right about exactly one thing the heroes didn't already know about ([[spoiler:the Deathly Hallows]]).** Harry reasons out his entire family tree, concluding that he's descended from a legendary trio of wizards. Hermione and Ron both think he's losing it. Granted, he was over-eager in his explanation, which was sort of hard to follow. But it was a sound argument nonetheless.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Live-Action TV ]]* An interesting subversion comes up in ''Series/TheFortyFourHundred'' where the show starts off with an event (4400 missing persons who disappeared over a span of 60 years suddenly reappearing, not a day older than when they left, in a ball of light near Seattle) so spectacular and public that not even the most skeptical can deny what has happened, yet everyone remains fairly skeptical about what caused it and what it means until the plot shows up to answer some questions.* ''Series/{{CSI}}'':** Subverted in an episode where one investigator's firm belief in spontaneous human combustion -- as both a phenomenon and the solution to a case -- is debunked by a scientific experiment they conduct.** There was also an episode where a psychic got killed because she managed to divine the place a murder victim's body had been hidden, and the villain heard of this. In the end of the episode it was revealed that she had no supernatural knowledge, and her assessment of the victim's soul's current location (she is in "Summer''land''") got misheard as "Summer''lin''" (a Vegas suburb), which was the area the body was hidden.* ''Series/{{House}}'': It's something that recurs with some regularity; House finds a perfectly rational explanation, but it's a big enough coincidence that the believers aren't convinced that it's not the supernatural at work.** In one episode the patient claims to have been abducted by aliens. It turns out to be a hallucination, just as House repeatedly insisted.** There was a patient who, ironically, was a Christian faith healer. House's adamant belief that the guy was a fraud (while the rest of the protagonists went from skepticism to doubt) turned out to be the key to identifying his disease.** Another episode had a woman who claims to be able to see the dead. It turned out she had ergotism.** There is an exception here; one patient comes in with a hallucination of Jesus (very vivid) and a host of other symptoms. The solution is found by ignoring the hallucination as a symptom, leaving the patient (a priest who had lost his faith) to believe it was divine intervention.* An episode of ''Series/{{Monk}}'' had a psychic who mysteriously woke up in her car in front of a dead body. She attributed it to her PsychicPowers, which previously hadn't really accomplished everything, but Monk found a decidedly non-supernatural explanation by the end.* ''Series/{{Psych}}'' ** The show is an inversion of this. The main character is a brilliant detective, but his superiors find it easier to believe that he can solve cases with psychic powers.** Also subverted in the episode "Psy vs. Psy", which features Shawn going up against the FBI's psychic, who's also a fake.** Played straight in a later episode when Shawn, Gus, and another guy go to a psychic while following a dead man's last few hours. After the psychic somehow manages to guess the bizarre idea in [[{{Cloudcuckoolander}} Shawn's]] head they tell her that the man she talked to the previous day was dead, causing her to freak out and [[OohMeAccentsSlipping drop the Romanian accent]]. However, before the guys leave she looks at Shawn and Gus's friend and draws the Death Tarot card. Said friend is dead by the next commercial break.* On ''Series/JohnDoe'', a woman believes she's having psychic visions of a serial killer, and reveals key details on his methods and location. It turns out that she'd nearly been murdered by the killer herself, and had escaped, but suffered so much blood loss in the process that her brain retained nothing but fleeting memories of her close call.* ''Series/TheMentalist'' is an interesting inversion of this: the main character, Patrick Jane, is a former TV psychic (and [[PhonyPsychic admitted fraud]]) who gave up that line of work after his insulting "psychic reading" of a serial killer wound up [[DeathByOriginStory getting his family killed]]. The skills he picked up while faking psychic powers (a [[HyperAwareness keen sense of observation]] and a good understanding of human nature) turn out to be quite useful for police work, though... He's strongly opposed to psychic claims because of this.* ''Series/{{NCIS}}'''s [[PerkyGoth Abby Sciuto]] occasionally floats a supernatural explanation for a death, because it would be cool, but eventually finds a mundane explanation. In one case, she made [=McGee=] collect corn stalks from a {{Crop Circle|s}}, and analyzed them for even the slightest anomaly, before she conceded they were fakes to throw investigators off.* Averting this trope is a key theme of ''Series/JonathanCreek.'' No matter how 'impossible' the event in question, Jonathan never entertains the possibility of a supernatural cause, and he is always right. Many of the perpetrators of the deliberate crimes/cons (as opposed to the accidental events) actually ''rely'' on SkepticismFailure to cover their tracks, but as Jonathan often points out, falling back on 'magic' is what most people do because they don't like to believe they can be so easily fooled by a trick (as he's a designer of magic tricks, he would know better than most.) Additionally, unlike many procedurals/detective programs that tease at the supernatural, the show ''never'' suggested that it might be real at any point in its five season run. [[/folder]]

[[folder: Video Games ]]* ''VideoGame/{{Scratches}}'' plays it with both sides: First, by reading the diaries and letters it is clear that the former owners of the mansion (where the game is set) were rational and intelligent people, subsequent findings show how they slowly began accepting supernatural explanations for everything that happened to them. The player character also starts experiencing strange unexplained phenomena culminating on fully embracing a supernatural solution, then a major twist occurs and a natural (and shocking) explanation presents. The Director's Cut goes even further by showing more evidence, but the final coda hints that there is still a missing piece while panning to the source of "the curse".** A secret non-canon bonus ending suggests that the events of the game are all in the player character's head, and that he, like James Blackwood before him, has gone crazy.* ZigZaggingTrope in ''VideoGame/DragonQuestVI'': Your party comes across a village in the middle of nowhere where it is said a floating island will take you to an enchanted place called the Isle o'Smiles. You meet a warrior by the name of [[MeaningfulName Skep Tickle, who's dubious of the whole story]]... until the island sails in, and he joins in the boozing and feasting provided by the cheerful waiters and bunny girls. Then when you wake up, the staff have returned to their true demonic forms so they can enslave the fools who believed in the Isle o' Smiles.[[/folder]]

[[folder: Western Animation ]]* ''WesternAnimtion/{{Metalocalypse}}'', of course, as [[Quotes/SkepticismFailure quoted]]. In a later episode, Dethklok one-upped even ''that'' by negotiating the standard DealWithTheDevil contract down to a $5 Hot Topic gift card in exchange for options on the soul of ''the Blues Devil himself''.* One notable exception to this rule is ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo''. [[ScoobyDooHoax The skeptical perspective is consistently proven correct]], to the point where one wonders why the gang continues to even entertain the notion of ghosts and monsters. However, this is inverted ([[http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2007/06/27/the-corruption-of-scooby-doo/ disappointing some skeptics]]) in the ''Franchise/ScoobyDoo'' movies, both theatrical and {{O|riginalVideoAnimation}}AV, where the monsters are real. Typically in these movies there is also a fake version of the monster that is unmasked before the real one shows up. They [[LampshadeHanging Hang A Lampshade On It]] in the first live-action movie, in one scene where Scooby tries to tell Shaggy that his new girlfriend isn't what she appears to be. He says, "Mary Jane is a man in a mask!"** Also {{lampshade|Hanging}}d in the more recent cartoon movies, such as the scene in ''WesternAnimtion/ScoobyDooOnZombieIsland'' where Fred [[MistakenForAnImposter yanks a genuine zombie's head off in an attempt to remove its "mask"]]. When the head moves in his hand and he stammers that it must be animatronic, the girls declare: "You're not a skeptic, Freddy, you're in denial!"* In the ''Literature/RainbowMagic'' movie, Rachel decides it's time to stop believing in fairies despite having met them when mean girls tease them. The fairies then need their help.[[/folder]]----